supercrime.org

Canada troops battle 10-foot Afghan marijuana plants

OTTAWA, Canada (Reuters) — Canadian troops fighting Taliban militants in Afghanistan have stumbled across an unexpected and potent enemy — almost impenetrable forests of marijuana plants 10 feet tall.

General Rick Hillier, chief of the Canadian defense staff, said Thursday that Taliban fighters were using the forests as cover. In response, the crew of at least one armored car had camouflaged their vehicle with marijuana.

“The challenge is that marijuana plants absorb energy, heat very readily. It’s very difficult to penetrate with thermal devices. … And as a result you really have to be careful that the Taliban don’t dodge in and out of those marijuana forests,” he said in a speech in Ottawa, Canada.

“We tried burning them with white phosphorous — it didn’t work. We tried burning them with diesel — it didn’t work. The plants are so full of water right now … that we simply couldn’t burn them,” he said.

Even successful incineration had its drawbacks.

“A couple of brown plants on the edges of some of those [forests] did catch on fire. But a section of soldiers that was downwind from that had some ill effects and decided that was probably not the right course of action,” Hiller said dryly.

One soldier told him later: “Sir, three years ago before I joined the army, I never thought I’d say ‘That damn marijuana’.”

Keither Sutherland (Jack Bauer) has signed a deal with 20th Century Fox to continue the hit show 24 for 3 more years. Thats makes 192 hours that supercrimals have to battle Jack.

Researchers at Duke have discovered that monkeys can fling poo using only the power of their minds! Check it out.

Armed bandits stole a page from the recent Harrison Ford movie Firewall, by kidnapping a security manager and his family on way to stealing 25-40 million pounds. I am pleased to report, that this seems like another case of supercrime done right - no one was injured. Still no arrests. They seem to have gotten away completely and have the authorities scratching their heads.

Today was the feast of St. Nicholas, popularly associated with our American Christmas traditions, so I thought it a good excuse to do some light research on the origins of our Santa Claus. Nicholas lived in Turkey during the fourth century and was known for secretly giving money and gifts, sometimes throwing them down chimneys.

In Germanic states St. Nicholas became associated with the god Odin, who held a hunting party and feast each winer. At night, children would leave boots near the fire with a carrot or straw for Odin’s eight-legged flying horse, and in the morning they would find their offerings had been replaced with gifts. St. Nicholas also may have been associated with the legend of a demon, sometimes called Krampus. This demon was seven feet tall with an exceptionally long tongue, goat legs, and a rampant sexual appetite and would slide down chimneys at night in order to kidnap, eat, or disembowel children. The monster was eventually caught by Saint Nicholas, who forced him instead to deliver gifts to the children every year.

Much of these legends still survives in Central Europe. I remember from my days at a Swiss-based elementary school celebrating the day of St. Nicklaus in the tradition of Germany and Central Europe. I left a carrot in a shoe outside my door overnight for the horse. I think I got a kiwi. During the day, Niklaus visited our classroom dressed as a bishop and accompanied by his African slave, Ruprecht. Mostly I remember Ruprecht throwing a lot of walnuts at us, and maybe a tangerine or two. Of course, according to tradition, Ruprecht is likely to punish naughty children by beating them with sticks, eating them, or throwing them in a sack and taking them to the Black Forest, where I can only assume they are beaten with sticks or eaten.

Our image of Santa Claus originates more directly from the Dutch version of Sinterklaas. Sinterklaas lives in Spain and arrives every year on a steamboat with one or several Moorish slaves named Black Pete. Again, Sinterklaas rewards offerings in shoes and brings gifts on the night of December 5. These gifts are delivered by Black Pete, who’s face is black from climbing down the chimneys. However, bad children could still potentially be beaten with sticks or taken to Spain in a sack.

Yet another possibly relevant myth was discovered by a mycologist studying psychoactive mushrooms. In Siberia during the midwinter festival, a flying shaman may be known to enter a home through the chimney and hang red and white psychedelic mushrooms, popular among reindeer, by the fire for the inhabitants.

The first truely great invention of the new age has arrived. No longer shall we be forced to raise our index finger to passing waitresses or fight with the common serfs at the bar. Yes, the people who brought us the Blitzkrieg and Levi’s have done it again. Behold, the Inteli-coaster or as they call it in Germany, the Smarzenbeerinorderinvanhausen. Well the people at New Scientist are calling it a “smart mat” but that sounds too much like smart card to me, and although beer security is one of my top concerns I just love hyphenated words.

The device contains an accelerometer, so you can either use it to play in pub quizes like the makers suggest, there by replacing the onerous task of pushing buttons with the eratic failing of your arms….or you can let the guy who knocked over your beer precisely how many meters/secord angry you are at him when you lob it at his head.

So if you like beer, and you like to keep drinking after you’ve lost the capacity for communication, then this is your lucky day.

Cheers,

symon

Gillette, maker of the Mach 3 Turbo, a three bladed razor for a while ruled the shaving world. Then the Gillette people got frightened, Schick came out with Quatro a four blade razor. The pressure was finally too much, and Gillette has responded, with a 5 blade razor called Fusion. In fact, there is even a 6th blade for shaving sideburns and mustaches. And you thought it was a joke.

John Conway, a brilliant mathematician most famous among the masses for his invention of the finite automata Game of Life, recently began publicizing a proof on the existence of free will. Although he does not claim to prove or disprove free will, he claims to condition it.

If there exist experimenters with (some) free will, then elementary particles also have (some) free will.

John Conway gave a lecture on this in Australia and his talk has been summarized in a very well written web document. Although this document does not explain the justification for a few quantum physics axioms, it does explain them well and how the proof follows from these axioms. From my remedial knowledge of quantum physics, these are not made up and certain theories that are starting to become accepted are built on them, such as Quantum Computing.

My comments on this do not object with any of Conway’s proof; they are actually more of a commentary on his conclusions drawn from his proof. Conway’s proof shows that a property of the result of the measurement of spin-1 particle is also embedded in the experimenter measuring the spin-1 particle. Conway represents this property as “free will.” Apparently at the conclusion of Conway’s talk a member of the audience objected to this and asked Conway to explain why this property is not randomness but free will. Conway conceded that “free will” was a name he used to describe the property, which he felt was appropriate, but it might as well be called “free whim.”

I believe that “free will” has connotations which are possibly inappropriate to claim. Rather these particles have some element which is immeasurable by current technology which is resulting in the apparent willful choice or randomness. These particles could very well have a deterministic underpinning, but our technology may be unable to measure this underlying deterministic process.

On the other hand, I think the inverse of this claim is almost intuitively true, although I haven’t attempted to write a formal proof. That is, if elementary particles have free will, then so do the experimenters that they comprise. I believe comparing Conway’s proof to its inverse sheds more light on its depth; that is, free will or randomness, or immeasurability need not lie at some level between the complete person and his/her synapses, because it also lies among elementary particles and potentially below. Thus, the quest for answering the mysteries of the working of the human consciousness may indeed rely on more fundamental principles than the neural firings of the brain. I am not suggesting that this area stop being studying, but it alone may not be sufficient to completely explain consciousness scientifically.

First off, Gmail is currently inaccessible. The DNS entry for gmail.com points to gmail.google.com which points to gmail.l.google.com which points to nothing. Either SkyNet changed it so no one could get to it (to fix a security issue?), or someone is poisoning their DNS. Either way, it sucks. NOTE (15 minutes later): They just fixed it.

On a more positive note, a worthy competitor to Gmail has emerged: GGG-Gmail! GGG-Gmail attempts to be more user-friendly by getting rid of much of the terminology that confuses the average user and replacing it with language anyone can understand. For example, instead of the confusing “Remember me on this computer” option, the user is presented with “Get off my nuts about the password. Shit.” I expect small but effective improvements like this will make GGG-Gmail’s popularity skyrocket.

Samir, an auto mechanic from St. Louis, got to do what I am sure hundreds of thousands if not millions of people had dreamed of doing: punch Saddam Hussein in the mouth. As an independent contractor translating for the army, Samir was the one who pulled Hussein from his worm hole. He immediately recognized Hussein and began cursing him for the torment he caused his family. When Saddam told him to shut up, Samir punched him in the mouth. Awesome. Samir is now serving as a consultant to help rebuild Iraq.